What Sought is not What is Found
by MelissaSueD
Summary: Set when Sylar and Noah were Company partners. Does NOT follow series entirely but has aspects of plot. Beware, OC Sylar in some instances the furhter the story goes. Rated M for later chapters.
1. Introduction

**I obviously don't own these characters or have any rights to the series so don't sue me I'm a poor writer who's just trying to get her kicks with fanfiction while she's working out her nasty kinks in her own personal hell of a novel she's trying to get published. I'm not certain where I'm going with this story so stick with me and we'll see where I go!**

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He looked up at her from underneath his heavy brow; gently stirring the contents of his drink as the bar tender absentmindedly dried the glasses behind the counter. He pulled the swizzle stick out of the glass and plucked the last blue cheese stuffed olive from it before taking a sip of the spirit residing in the tumbler. It burned his throat and did little to help dim the dull ache inside of him. He could almost hear her inner workings as if listening to a clock tick and click, gears catching, tumblers sliding. He was figuring out how she worked, what made her essentially her.

He knew she would be here, he had read the file that Noah so carelessly placed out open for his view in his office. Granted they were working together, albeit reluctantly, but you'd think the guy would show a little bit more reserve when it came to the lives of the people the company was tracking down? He thought this might be a set up, but Noah was playing daddy Bennett at home, trusting that he would keep his nose clean this night before their next assignment on the following evening.

_Noah, Noah, Noah…_ he thought, _You always underestimate me. _

The girl in question was daintily sipping her martini around the curve of the bar from him. He could stare at her without making it obvious. She was just in his eyesight. Her power intrigued him. She was able to heal others as efficiently as he healed himself unless someone jabbed him in that tiny little bit of space in his brain that put him in stasis until the object was removed. Her ability had endless potential, endless torture potential. He could virtual do whatever he wanted to someone without repercussion and it would all just go away with a thought or a flick of the wrist. Oh yes, he wanted this one… her services to him would be invaluable.

The girl in question finally looked across the bar and caught his eye. He did his best to give his patent roguish smile and wink at her. She blushed like crazy and he had the bartender bring her another drink of whatever she was having. The girl smiled tentatively at him when she received her martini and made her way to his side of the bar. She moved with such grace and poise that she had to have been a dancer. The skirts of her loose fitted dress billowed out around her shapely calves as she claimed the stool next to him, placing her drink near his. She smiled again sheepishly and extended her hand, "Hi, I'm Caitlyn Burns."

He took her hand in his gently and brought it up towards his lips, placing a gentle and lingering kiss on her fingertips. After he removed his skin from hers he looked dead into her eyes with a half-cocked smile and said, "It's an absolute pleasure to meet you miss. I'm Gabriel Gray."


	2. I know what you are

**Here's the next little installment of the story, hope those that are reading it enjoy it. I'm not too sure how many people come across this… I wish there was a way to track readership :(. Anywho, I'm going to try to keep the chapters short and sweet. I'm hoping to get another update up in a few days. Take care!**

**Oh and I'm a writer aka a broke joke, I don't own these characters don't sue me Heroes people!**

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The girl sat there on the barstool trying to appear as confident as possible. Sylar could tell when someone was putting on an act; he did intrinsically know how things worked. They sat there in silence for a few minutes, not awkwardly, but just momentarily enjoying each others silent company as they continued enjoying their drinks. Caitlyn broke the silence.

"You're like me, aren't you?"

Sylar almost choked on his Beefeaters. That caught him off guard. He tried to cover up the embarrassing moment by subtly coughing, it probably wasn't working but it was worth a shot. "I'm not sure I know what you mean." He stated, look at her and raising an eyebrow.

"You can do things that most humans can't. You're above average. I used to call it not being normal or 'the weirdness' but it sounds better saying 'hey I'm above average!'" She looked at him inquisitively. Sylar was a little peeved at her and was squeezing his glass a little too hard. She one-upped him. Usually it was the other way around, he put the drop on people, breeching the 'abilities' conversation first. It put the ball in his court. Now the ball was in Caitlyn's and he didn't like the lack of control one bit; not one bit at all.

He was going to play dumb for a while. "I fix watches really well, some say expertly. So yeah I guess you could say I'm an above average tinkering of watches." He gave her a roguish wink.

Caitlyn slapped her hand down on the bar angrily. "You know what I'm talking about. Please don't play me for a fool. I can see how you run, how you work, inside and out. I know everything you can do and all that you're capable of. I can also see that you're severely on the fritz. But if you're going to sit there and be a dipshit then it was nice knowing you."

Caitlyn grabbed her purse from the neighboring bar stool and stood up in a huff. She was in such a huff that she even knocked said stool over. Sylar just sat there, look at her, baffled. _What in the hell? _"Stop!" He ground out at her. She continued on her way away from him and towards the door of the bar. "I said STOP!" With that last word Sylar used the new power he had acquired and sonically shoved her slightly with the sound waves. She stood rooted to the spot with her hand on the door, goose bumps rising on her flesh.

"I think you need to leave buddy." Sylar spun around to see the bartender looking at him angrily, holding an empty glass bottle that once contained liquor. Like that would be an effective weapon against him. But he did not want to cause a scene.

"Sorry, I'll be on my way." He threw down several bills and walked towards Caitlyn.

"Don't come back in here again." The bartender yelled at his retreating back. That was fine with him, he didn't plan on it. He had got what he came for, well, sort of.

Caitlyn had not moved from the spot where she stopped at; nor did she turn around to face him when Sylar approached her. When they were standing shoulder to shoulder she finally spoke. "You're a real asshole you know that?"

"Tell me something I don't already know." He chuckled grimly. This girl was a little spitfire. "So why are you still standing here? Did I scare you with that little bit of power?" He said, leaning over her in a mildly menacing manner.

"That voice thing? No. It's what else you could have done if I wouldn't have stopped that made me stay where I was. Like I said, I can read you, all of you. And you're really fucked up buddy." She turned her face to look Sylar in the eyes. He didn't quite know how to take that. He had been called a lot of things, mostly a monster, especially by his new partner Noah. He just kind of took it as it came. But coming from her, it bothered him slightly.

"What do you mean you can read me?" Sylar asked, not commenting on her degradation of him.

"Oh boy. We've got a lot to talk about. If we're playing 20 questions here pal you've got to answer some of mine too, capiche?" Hearing her say 'capiche' made Sylar bust out laughing, a real honest-to-God laugh… something he hadn't done in a long time. Caitlyn didn't like it very much. "What the hell are you laughing at?"

He tried to rein it in but was failing horribly. "Sorry, I'm sorry. I just haven't heard the word capiche since a few of my friends and I used to run around in elementary school pretending to be mafiosos telling everyone if they didn't talk we'd give them a brand-new pair of cement shoes. It just made me laugh. It wasn't you. I swear." Sylar had a tear or two streaming down his cheek from laughing so hard.

His answer seemed to placate her. "Alright then, let's go someplace and talk. Where do you want to go?"

"How about someplace public for now, perhaps someplace private later?" He leered at her and she turned bright red. Apparently he could still turn the charm on and off whenever he wanted.

"I know a little diner around the corner that has pretty decent coffee and pie of that's fine with you?" She said reaching for the door again.

"That's perfect." Sylar flicked the door open before she even had a chance to grab the handle. This elicited a gasp from her and a smirk from him. Tonight was going to be interesting to say the least.


	3. Stop trying to scare me

**Still not sure where this is going everybody! I have a really vague idea. I know I want to throw a little curve ball and have some naughtiness, but other than that it's a loose outline. So please stick with me and let's just see where this goes together! I'm kind of playing with this one while I work through another fanfic and my own novel.**

Sylar kept pace close behind the woman as the walked towards the end of the block. He tried to watch the back of her head as they moved; it was entirely less distracting than other parts of her body. There was just something about this girl that confused, intrigued, baffled, and stirred him. He was going to enjoy toying with her before he got what he wanted. She was tall and in good shape. And the way she walked in front of him, subconsciously sashaying her hips, stirred something he thought was long dead in him, his libido. Maybe tonight he should be all work and no play - it was making for a very dull Gabriel Gray.

At the end of the block Caitlyn took a left and continued down about three buildings before stopping outside of a little diner. "It's not much but it's a good place to grab a cup of coffee, a piece of a pie, and talk." She said, blushing slightly.

Sylar was confused at the reason to her blush. It made him quirk up his lip a little in the brief ghost of a smile. "Why are you blushing?" He asked bluntly. He was never known for his tact.

"It's a family owned business, my family." She said quietly.

_Oh fuck. _Thought Sylar, she inadvertently walked him right into a trap and didn't even realize it. Or did she? That saucy little minx! Caitlyn was turning out to be very interesting indeed. If they were going to her families' diner they would definitely see him in association with her. So if Caitlyn were to go missing, they would have a pretty good idea who the last person she was seen with was. This either meant that Sylar would have to be very sleek at covering his tracks or he would just have to take out the entire family. She was good and she didn't even know it. He wished he could give her the credit. He would just have to put off some of his more interesting plans for her until a later date, so as to give himself the benefit of the doubt in the eyes of the police. It's bad enough that he had several warrants on his head. Noah was probably going to come looking for him the instant this one went missing too. Oh well, such was the nature of the game he liked to play to fulfill his need to know more, to covet more.

They walked into the diner and Sylar had to admit he thought the place was charming in its own little way. This would be the kind of place he would come to when he wanted to relax and read a book while grabbing a bite to eat. The floor had that typical checkerboard pattern and the booths were a bright electric red. There was even an oldschool jukebox sitting off in one corner playing a song he didn't recognize by a crooner whose voice he barely registered. Caitlyn led them over to a booth towards the back of the diner. As they were walking in, two of the cooks shouted out 'hello's to her. They slid into the booth an a waitress named Trudy, who of course knew Caitlyn, promptly gave them menus and walked away.

Sylar sat perusing the menu for a while. He wasn't quite sure what he had a hankering for and after a few minutes he set the menu down and looked at Caitlyn. She had been watching him the whole time. He gave her a smirk. "What do you recommend since you are so familiar with this place?"

She gave him a flirty little smile and said "Is your appetite small or large right now?"

Oh so she was going to play that kind of game with him. "You have no idea what kind of appetites I have and how big they can get." He leered at her.

She merely tapped her head. "If you are referring to what I think you are referring to, then yes I do. But I was talking about your stomach." Well that shut him up for a minute.

"I well, uh, uhem," Sylar cleared his throat. "I haven't really eaten much today. I wouldn't mind actually grabbing a really dinner."

"Chicken, beef, pork, seafood, or other?" She rattled off quickly.

"Come again?" He arched a questioning eyebrow.

"Which of those sound more appealing to you silly or which is your favorite? I'm helping you narrow down your dinner choices." She gave him a genuine smile. Caitlyn was cute, he had to hand her that.

"Chicken, I could definitely go for something with chicken right now."

"Excellent. Definitely get the smokehouse chicken sandwich. You'll love it."

"I will then, are you getting dinner too?" He asked, just to seem polite.

"I was just going to get a basket of fries to munch on and a cup of coffee." Caitlyn was a fidgety person. Until Trudy came back she kept fixing everything at the table into perfect alignment and rows, counting the sugars and making sure they were even. Maybe that was a side effect of her power, healing and fixing everything she came into contact with. Sylar continued to wonder to himself about it until their waitress returned with their coffee and to take their order. Caitlyn did all the work and soon he was slipping a sugar and a little creamer into his beverage and stirring it. He could feel her eyes on him.

"Can I help you?" He asked, arching a brow.

She looked a little chagrined. "Sorry I'm just trying to figure out how you got this far…" She let the sentence trail off and he wasn't exactly sure what she meant.

"Care to elaborate?" He asked with a hint of annoyance in his voice.

"Deep down you're right. Like all of your inner workings have a vibe that is fine, but outside of that something just goes so horrible wrong. It's like you had an electric fence surrounding your essential being and someone came in and pissed on it." Strange and interesting imagery, but he got the point of it.

"So you are saying I was built right but then somehow got fucked up along the way?" Sylar asked as he took a sip of his coffee, starring at her over the rim.

"Kind of sort of. But that's all jumping ahead. Let's go back to the beginning. Hi, hello, I'm Caitlyn. Nice to meet you." She stuck her hand across the table. He had to hand it to her, she was quirky as hell and it mildly amused him.

"Well alright then," he said as he took her hand. "I'm Gabriel Gray, otherwise known as Sylar in some circles… and it's a pleasure to meet you." At his pseudonym he saw her eyes contract in fear. She knew of him. The name he gave her earlier didn't register but it was plain as day that the name 'Sylar' did. She pulled her hand out of his.

"What do you want with me?" Caitlyn asked, fear laced her voice.

"At the moment, I want to enjoy some food and a cup of coffee with you as well as talk. Later, well… we can discuss that later." He continued to nonchalantly sip on his coffee while watching her. She didn't move nor did she volunteer to talk to him. The sat in silence until his sandwich and her fries arrived. Trudy noticed the tension between the two of them and laid a hand on Caitlyn's shoulder.

"Is everything alright dear?" She asked quietly, quickly shooting her eyes in Sylar's direction. He snorted outloud and started digging into his food. Not even bothering to watch the two of them to see if Caitlyn was giving away any kind of information nonverbally. He'd been placed in situations similar to this too often and he always got out of them. He was a survivor and he would continue to be one. The truth of the matter was Sylar was unstoppable when he put his mind to it. At the moment, his mind was to it.

Caitlyn shocked the hell out of him, causing him to fumble the glass bottle of ketchup as she said to Trudy in a most steady voice "No everything is fine and the food looks fantastic! Thanks so much!" Her dismissal was even cheerful. As soon as the waitress walked away Sylar hazarded a glance at Caitlyn.

"We will talk. Stop trying to scare me away." She said with as much strength as she could muster behind her voice.

_A/N: Sorry it took so long for an update. I got heavily involved in other life matters as well as writing in my own personal novel (p.s. my editor can go suck eggs). I have a vague idea of where this story is going so the plot is kind of evolving as I write. If anyone has any suggestions whatsoever…send them my way by all means!_


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